


Of Red Strings and Love

by Trilinklover



Category: BanG Dream! Girl's Band Party! (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Because Kisses are the best way to tell if you love someone amirite?, Except instead of men its women, F/F, Fluff., Happy Ending, How Do I Tag, I tried my best, Kisses, Moca teases quite a bit but means good, Promise, Red String of Fate, Sorry Tsugu I don't think I did you justice honey, Soulmates, Spin the Bottle, Will add more tags if they come up, fluff?, no beta we die like men, was for bandori rarepair week but i didn't post in time i think so..., yeah.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-05
Updated: 2020-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:28:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23020087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trilinklover/pseuds/Trilinklover
Summary: Soulmates. An incredibly important aspect to modern-day society that all but dictates who you are going to end up with later in life. Be it a romantic soulmate connection or a platonic soulmate one, the people bound to you by this special bond are said to remain by your side until the bitter end.It is rarely known which soulmate identifying trait a pairing would have, as there are many different ones fitting for each individual bond. From the classic red string of fate that you can see leading to your significant other after one turns 15, to a more physical showing of who is matched with who such as timers that count down until you meet your soulmate for the first time that is generally displayed upon your wrist; anything is possible when it comes to the signs that your partner in life will meet you someday.Meet Himari Uehara, a girl who wants more than anything to find her soulmate. Through years in her life she learns more and more about herself and just what her connection to her soulmate could possibly be.
Relationships: Hazawa Tsugumi/Uehara Himari
Comments: 2
Kudos: 31
Collections: Bandori Rarepair Week (2019-present)





	Of Red Strings and Love

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all for choosing to read this and I'm sorry if the quality of the fic isn't the best!! I did mean to release this much much sooner but... I just didn't until now! I hope you all enjoy~

Soulmates. An incredibly important aspect to modern-day society that all but dictates who you are going to end up with later in life. Be it a romantic soulmate connection or a platonic soulmate one, the people bound to you by this special bond are said to remain by your side until the bitter end.

It is rarely known which soulmate identifying trait a pairing would have, as there are many different ones fitting for each individual bond. From the classic red string of fate that you can see leading to your significant other after one turns 15, to a more physical showing of who is matched with who such as timers that count down until you meet your soulmate for the first time that is generally displayed upon your wrist; anything is possible when it comes to the signs that your partner in life will meet you someday. 

There are always new romantic novels, movies, manga, and anime released about Soulmates meeting each other and falling in love - just like in a fairy tale. That is of course, how most children find out if they haven’t already heard their parents story of how they meet a thousand times by now. Romantic stories of love - how they had held onto the faith that they’d find ‘the one’. How they would find someone to stand by their side until the end of time.

And that, is how Himari had come across the term. Her parents would always say stuff about how she would eventually meet someone ‘very special’ like how ‘mommy is to daddy’ but she never really thought about what that meant until she had began to actually pay attention to those kinds of movies when she was about four years old. She was watching a romantic tragedy - “The Titanic” when she had popped the question to her parents. 

\---

“Mommy? Why did those two have a long red string attached to their pinkies? Why not anyone else?” The small girl with pink pigtails asks, bouncing on the edge of her seat as she watches as the two leads make eye contact, seemingly following the thin line of string tied to their pinkies. It is clear that the young child is just wondering why they’d do something like that - tying their fingers together. Wouldn’t the string get tangled up as they move about? Wouldn’t they also not be able to walk away from each other when they wanted to go play with their different groups of friends? 

Her mother lets out a little laugh before looking to the girls father with a smile. They have an intense moment of eye contact before the mother answers the innocent question. 

“That, honey is what we call a soul-string. You remember Mommy and Daddy’s talks about how we first met right? About our worlds expanding into beautiful colors the moment we looked at each other?” The young girl nods, clearly excited to find out just what this is. She may have heard the story many times but seeing something else that… that magical with her own eyes made her extremely curious about its origin.

“Well, It’s kind of like that. The red sting shown between the two main characters is something that normally, only they would be able to see. It’s the bond that connects them to each other - be it as romantic partners, like the two in the movie and you’re very own mommy and daddy or as a platonic bond like someone who will be your best friend for life~” The mother explains to her daughter before giving the man beside her a kiss on the lips. Of course, that causes the four year old to turn her attention away from her parents because eww who wants to watch people you see every day kiss?? Certainly not her, that’s for sure! 

She returns her attention to the screen before her, and watches as the love story develops before her very eyes between the two main characters - Jack and Rose. She watches as the bond grows and develops before eventually, the two are forever ripped away from each other. When Jack dies to save Rose the four year old watching begins to bawl her uncontrollably, being completely inconsolable as her parents who were watching the movie beside her tries and fails at calming her down. The red string of fate between the two love-birds severed on screen alongside the young childs’ heart. 

“I” She begins, continuing her crying even as the credits roll. “I’ll never love and lose my soulmate like that! I-I won’t let it happen!” She shakes her head back and forth - she won’t end up like that, being left alone and sad as her soulmate is lost in the sea!! She refuses to be! Her parents could do nothing but smile at their little girl with affection at the comments - her father taking her into his arms and giving her a big tickle attack when all else fails. That of course is finally enough to cause the tears of sadness turn into those of laughter and joy. Though the tears may be momentarially forgotten, the concept of soulmates - how there is someone in life born to be able to connect like you like no one else can - remain with her.

\---

Meeting her best friends would shape Himari’s view on soulmates further. She has until this point learned about how others have different showings of this phenomenon however the conversation that really opened her eyes to that fact occurred one day when the girls were about ten years old. 

It was raining outside so of course the group of five had to decide which of their houses they would go to play at, eventually deciding on Himari’s for this particular day. They then gathered inside her room and began to look around. It was rather simplistic, with a lot of pink coating the walls and bedding. There were also a few more subtle colors coating the rooms furniture - different shades of Red for Tomoe and Ran, Yellow for Tsugu and Green for Moca.

It was when the group were commentating about the room and everything in it when Moca commented on something strange to the others in the group. She apparently couldn’t see the color green. The greens of grasses, the greens of the traffic lights, the greens of Himari’s eyes, the green decorations across her room - nothing.

When one of the curious children asked why Moca couldn’t see it, the bread loving girl simply stretched out a bit on top of Himari’s bed to get comfortable. Before long, she was providing an answer to the attentive and eager children that surrounded her scattered about the room for their ‘playdate’. 

“Hmm, Moca-chan just has never been able to see the color green~ It’s supposedly the color of some aspect of Moca-chan’s soulmate, aren’t you jealous fufu~” She answers, honesty dropped with a bit of teasing in there~

Of course, Ran responded next, raising a little hand in response. It had a bit of drawings on it despite the fact that Ran hadn’t been near a marker for the entire time they have been in Himari’s room and that certainly wasn’t there the first time!!

“So I’ve been told that my soulmate is connected to me through our skin. I… sometimes write to them and they sometimes write to me” A simple comment from Ran but it results in Himari quickly bustling over alongside Tsugumi to take a look at the girls hand. Looking Ran’s hand that is filled with little scribbles of music notes is at least romantic is enough to make Himari squeal. Tsugumi looks at the little drawings with a smile while Moca and Tomoe both move in to take a closer look.

“Hey, that reminds me…” Tomoe speaks looking at the little music notes drawn on Ran’s hand. “I can hear random singing and piano music sometimes playing in my head - my parents are pretty sure that’s from my soulmate while we’re on the topic!” 

“Really?!?” Himari exclaims, looking to her close friend. How had she not known about these kinds of things sooner?? 

“Really~” Tomoe answers with a small flourish. 

“It’s a shame I don’t have my soulmate connected to me like that just yet” Himari pouts as Tsugumi sits beside her, moving her hand to grab onto the pink haired girls into her own.

“It’s okay Himai-chan, I don’t have anything obvious like that yet either. We probably have one of the types that appear as you grow up!” Tsugumi is quick to comfort, taking Himari's small hands into her own rather tiny ones. Himari perks up at the brunettes words of comfort.

“Oh yeah, those do exist don’t they?~ I wonder what type of soulmate signaling thing we’ll have?” Himari replies back to Tsugu. She really is curious about that, how will she know?? When will she know?? 

“I don’t know but I’m sure it’ll be something special so no need to rush in getting there~” Tsugumi states with a small smile while still holding onto Himari's hands gently. The brunette is certain that one day both of them will find the one meant for them~ 

The group of children quickly go back to chattering as they usually do on play-dates like these, however this conversation would stay with Himari for a while to come.

\-----

"Do you wanna play a game~?" Moca asks the group of friends, having grown up quite a bit since that previous conversation. They are now 14 years old and quite a lot has happened in the four years since that conversation that they had when they were 10. Despite the years that have passed since then, the group of friends were still extremely close to one another. They hung out in school and out of school as often as they could -- it would be quite an achievement to find any of this close knit group alone. 

"Ehh?? A game?" Himari is the first to inquire, head tilting to the side. Tsugumi and Tomoe looked over curiously as well, not vocal in their confusion for now. Ran however was very quick to deny it before it even began.

"No" A simple reply, but denial all the same.

"Come on Ran, it'll be fun~" The pale haired bread lover refutes back. 

"We should at least hear her out first, Ran" Tsugumi is quick to meditate in a soft voice with Tomoe nodding along with her.

"Yeah! Ran, you shouldn't turn it down before hearing what it is!" The red haired girl asserts. After a bit more pestering from all of the girls Ran eventually sighs. 

"Okay, okay fine. I'll listen, please don't be too out there with this Moca…" With Ran giving up going against them on this (it's not like she minded in the first place) the other girls gave a small cheer before turning their full attention to Moca.

"Ya know how we all have soulmates that we haven't met right? Well, how about we play spin the bottle in a way that you need to kiss whoever it lands on~? It'll be good practice for when we'll need to eventually kiss our soulmates!" Moca lets out. And with that Ran gets up and attempts to leave as Himari, Tsugumi, and Tomoe all blush at the idea of doing that. Moca is quick enough to catch Ran by her t-shirt before the soon to be vocalist can even leave the bedroom.

“Nope~ You aren’t getting out of this one Ran! Think of your soulmate~ How embarrassing it would be if on your first meeting sparks flew and then you both kissed. How horrible it would turn out to be if you were really bad at it~ Poor Ran’s soulmate, stuck with someone who doesn’t know how to kiss them properly. Woe is them~” Moca teases in an attempt to get Ran to stop running away. The short haired girl stops her attempts at retreating and sighs. 

“Fine, I’ll play your game.” Ran mutters, returning to the group of girls with a sigh taking a seat in between Himari and Moca. Their group is now seated in a circle in the following order, Himari, Ran, Moca, Tsugumi, and then Tomoe before circling back to Himari. Ran doesn’t look like she minds playing the game all that much no matter how much she tries to deny it. By the time that little encounter is over, Tomoe has calmed down enough to grab the bottle of soda the group had just finished sharing. What? They were thirsty earlier. 

“I guess we’re all in right?!” Tomoe asks the crowd. Himari nods her head, her face flushed as she even thinks about kissing anyone -- including her closest friends. Tsugumi follows the pink haired girls lead with a nod of her own. She seems determined to learn how to do this right! The other two had already shown their agreement and as such, they were all set to begin! 

“Okay~ Moca-chan will go first as I suggested it~” Moca speaks, taking the bottle that Tomoe had placed in the middle of their pseudo circle (that’s more of a pentagon but you know how it goes) and spins it around and around until it eventually stops. The tip of the bottle is facing towards… Tsugumi. 

The brunette flushes as Moca crawls over to her, and with a smirk just goes in for the kiss. It’s short, but overall not bad for a first kiss. Lips making contact with lips but not going much further than that chaste connection - not for the first one of the game at least. 

Of course, the other girls blush and avert their eyes away from the contact. Himari feels something kind of curl up inside her chest. It feels quite odd and for someone who is usually very in-touch with her emotions she is feeling rather out there. What even is this feeling? And why did it appear now? She tries to shove those thoughts and feelings away as she turns her attention back towards the group.

“I-I wasn’t ready Moca” Tsugumi manages to say through her increasingly flustered state. Her face is close to Moca’s still and it really seems like she was somewhat taken aback, but she isn’t really complaining about what had happened.

“Fufu~ Not all of your kisses will happen when you’re ready Tsugu~ Just getting you prepared for your future lover~” Moca replies with a small laugh, returning to their position between Himari and Ran. 

The game went on for a while, each of the girls getting a turn to spin as it landed on them. Tsugu spinning it to land on Ran, Ran landing on Tomoe, and Tomoe right back to Tsugumi. Of course, that made it Tsugumi’s turn to spin the bottle once more.

Still extremely flustered from her kisses with Moca, Ran and Tomoe, she takes the bottle that was in the middle of the circle and gives it a mighty spin. Around and around it goes until eventually, it stops. 

It pointed towards Himari, the only person who had yet to be landed on, and the only one who Tsugumi has yet to kiss herself.

And that was the cue for Himari to become even more red than before. Tsugumi, having done this before crawled over to where Himari was sitting with a small smile displayed across her face. 

“So, kissing aha,,” Himari clearly has no idea what she is doing here, however she does turn to face Tsugumi. The brunette’s face is also flushed as she looks at the pink haired girl.

“Yep, so… I guess I’m going to do it now, okay?” Tsugumi states in the form of a question. The shorter girl nods at that statement before closing her eyes. She doesn’t quite know what exactly to do having never been kissed before. However, any worries she may have had about that soon disappear as Tsugumi closes the distance between their lips.

Himari’s eyes are closed and yet it feels like fireworks had just went off in a colorful explosion before them. Lips that feel soft against her own dance against her own. Himari soon melts into the kiss, moving her arms to wrap around Tsugumi’s shoulders at the same time as the brunette had moved hers around the pink haired girls waist. 

The kiss deepens a little bit, a little more contact with their bodies, a little bit more lip to lip action but nothing more than that. A moment later, the two notice a cheer from behind them. Backing away from each other with their faces blazing with heat they face their friends. 

“T-that certainly was something” Tomoe admits with a heavy blush on her face. All Ran is able to do past her own blush is nod at that, likely trying to calm her own burning face. Moca however is easily able to come up with something to retort to that.

“Wow, Moca-chan thought that seemed rather spicy in comparison to the other kisses we’ve had in this game! As Tomo-chin said, it really was something to witness hehe~ Are all kisses with Hii-chan like that?” That of course, is met with a push from Himari herself, as if she would be able to escape Moca’s teasing with that.

“N-no need to blame it all on H-Himari-chan. I did do half of the kissing as well” Tsugumi says, trying to defend her blushing friend. Of course that makes the pink haired girl blush even further but it was worth a try.

“A-anyways it’s my turn now right?” Himari asks with a blush, trying to calm herself. She can’t stop thinking about the feeling of Tsugu’s lips on her own, their breaths mixing together and… no she really needs to focus on something else! She reaches forward towards the empty soda bottle and spins that bottle. Eventually the spinning stops. 

It lands facing Tsugumi once more. Both girls just stare at the bottle that had clearly betrayed them in this situation. It takes the probing of Moca for their lips to make contact once again -- after all this was just a game, right? The sparks fly once again inside Himari’s mind however, she is too shy considering the last time they kissed to simply sink into this. It’s a quick contact but her breath feels like it was taken away just as the longer kiss had felt like. 

Her heart races as they part from their second kiss in a row. Butterflies soar in her stomach as Tsugumi looks at her as well with her beautiful chocolate colored eyes and Himari doesn’t quite know why. How did a simple kiss, one that wasn’t supposed to mean anything cause her to react in this manner? 

The answer was something that had become more obvious to her as the ‘game’ continued and she eventually had to kiss her other friends. None of them have evoked the same sort of spark in her as her kisses with Tsugu had. She… she must feel something for Tsugumi. She knows that it has to be true -- she is rarely wrong about her own emotions after all, but this simple fact?… this hurts because what will she do if her soulmate finds her and then discovers that she was harboring a major crush on Tsugumi? 

This particular crisis continues on for the rest of the sleepover and remains in the back of her mind as she slowly matures further. What if her heart isn’t in the right place? What if this… bit of emotions got in the way of her soulmate loving her and vice versa. What if… Tsugumi found her soulmate before she herself got any indication of getting close to meeting her own? What if Himari doesn’t have a soulmate at all? What if she ends up all alone? What if…

\-----

This dilemma continued to plague Himari’s mind for a long time after that particularly memorable sleepover. Eventually, another year has flown by and Himari’s 15’th birthday was the next day. So, of course the girl had remained awake in her bed just waiting for any change that could happen. She had read online about how some soulmate signs appear on people’s 6’th, 15’th, 16’th, 18’th and 21’st birthday for specific showings so she was eagerly anticipating what may come of her own. 

A worry constantly plagues her mind as she lies there. What if she does find out that she has a soulmate. What if it’s not Tsugumi. What if it’s someone she doesn’t like?? Of course she’d love them but… she just really hopes it’s someone she can love. She already is crushing really hard on Tsugu so… she hopes that the brunette is her soulmate despite how slim the odds of that happening are.

No matter how much her eyes droop due to tiredness or how large the glowing numbers of her alarm clock shines in the darkness of her room the pink haired girl absolutely refuses to sleep -- not that her worries would let her do that anyways. Any moment her soulmate sign may appear - she knows it.

However, the hours tick on, 12 am becomes 1 am, and 1am becomes 3 am. Eventually, Himari’s alarm went off without her getting a single ounce of sleep and not noticing a single odd sensation on her body. With a yawn , an indicator of just how tired she truly is, she sits up, knowing that the members of Afterglow -- the band the group of friends had just formed -- would probably have a birthday party for her. 

The girl rolls out of her bed, not at all caring for her appearance as she stumbles into her bathroom to try and wake herself up a bit more. She turns on the sink with somewhat bleary eyes and pools water into her hands as they clasp together. With a quick motion she splashes her face in an attempt to wake herself up despite her severe lack of sleep. 

She turns away from the bathroom sink after turning off the water before taking a double take at her hands. Was that? It… It was. It was a red string of fate, connected to her own pinky finger. This was the same soulmate sign that she had seen way back when she was a child. It was one of the most cliche and honestly romantic ones that she could know of. The realization that she does have a soulmate out there slaps her in the face. 

This red string?? It would lead her to whoever is on the other side. It’s a matter of if they can even see the string though is it not? Because it took her this long to be able to see it, this does seem to be something related to their 15’th birthdays. 

She toys at the string, pulling at it, twirling it around her finger and just following it with her eyes. A knock interrupts her thoughts that seem to have wandered. The digital clock reads that it was 1:05 pm which definitely caught Himari herself off-guard. She hadn’t prepared anything at all and so she just squeaks, running towards her wardrobe to try and find something to wear. 

She eventually locates her casual outfit, quickly getting that on before tying up her hair that she probably should have done specially for the day into her signature hairstyle. She yawns before stumbling out of her room and into the main area of her house where her mother was waiting for her to have exited. 

Honestly, she looks like a hot mess. Her mother chuckles at that, noticing just the state her daughter appears to be in. She walks over to Himari and gives her a kiss on the cheek. Based on how much the younger pink haired girl has been staring at her smallest finger on her right hand it was easy for the mother to figure out the cause of her daughters dishevelment.

“Have fun today, okay Himari? And do make sure to get enough sleep tomorrow night” The woman speaks, adjusting her daughters hair and outfit. Himari pouts at that, being seen right through but she nods all the same. 

“Okay Mom, I’ll be back later~” The girls says before racing to the door where her friends were gathered, or rather only Moca was located. Strange. 

“Hia Moca~ Where are the others?” Himari asks with a tilt of her head. 

“Oh~ They’re at the super secret location Moca-chan is gonna bring you to~” Moca teases, poking the nose of the girl before her with a giggle. 

“Where is the secret location?!?” Himari inquires before letting out a yawn. The girl was still exhausted having not slept a wink since whenever she woke up yesterday. She is super lucky that today is the weekend, that’s for sure. 

“Tired aren’t ya Hii-chan? Anyways that’s a secret~ I hope you won’t fall asleep with this on ya, we’re taking the super special mystery route to our destination!” Moca speaks while taking the time to pull out a pink blindfold from wherever she had hidden it on her person. 

“Nooo” Yes Himari, you are extremely tired. “I won’t Moca, don’t worry!” That much she can say for sure. She isn’t going to fall asleep while walking!! She gently takes the blindfold from Moca’s hands and places it on herself, blocking her vision. 

“How many fingers is Moca-chan holding up Hii-chan~” Moca’s teasing voice asks from the darkness the pink haired girl is now trapped in. Unable to see, she comes up with an answer shortly after the question is popped.

“Hmm, three fingers and a thumb?” 

“Nope, Moca-chan is holding up two thumbs right attcha~ That wrong answer means your vision is blocked out enough to go to our destination though~ Onwards!” Moca cheers as she takes Himari’s hand into her own. Himari fears she’ll trip as she can’t see the ground her feet is walking on, but surprisingly Moca is taking their trip nice and easy. 

It takes about thirty minutes of walking, taking turns, crossing streets and she’s almost certain that they have turned around and backtracked more than once -- probably in an attempt to confuse her in regards to the destination -- before they stop. Moca puts a hand on her back in order to gently guide her through the doors and soon enough they stop once more.

“We’re here~ Hii-chan you can take off the blindfold now!” Moca speaks, backing away from her to go somewhere. Rather than wondering where they ran off to the tired pink haired girl removes the blindfold. 

Her eyes take a moment to adjust to the light before she hears the cheers. 

“Surprise!!” It feels like the whole room is erupting in that single word. She’s tired, and has a bit of a headache but she can’t help but smile at that as well as tear up a bit. Okay not a bit, a lot. It would appear that they were at the Hazawa cafe, and there was a mini party for her. 

“Thank you all;;;” Himari gets out. She’s sobbing and trying to wipe her tears away when she notices that her red string seems… much smaller than before. The girl wipes her tears away before following the red colored string with her eyes.

It takes a moment, her heart beating a mile a minute before she finds where it leads. Or rather, where it ends. Right attached to Tsugumi’s pinky is the red string. Himari pauses for a moment, staring in shock at the brown haired girl she had realized she had a crush on all that time. It’s right there, on Tsugu’s finger. And… and hadn’t Tsugu said something about noticing her sign on her own birthday which feels like ages ago now?? So… how long has Tsugu kept this to herself? 

Oh well, Himari’s tired and honestly? She’s mainly filled with relief about her soulmate being someone she knew and had a crush on. So she kinda just, flings herself at Tsugu, completely catching the brunette unaware. 

Luckily, the others there knew that Himari was Tsugu’s soulmate due to the brunette’s own freak-out about it all those months ago so they didn’t really expect anything less than this. Ran looks away with a blush on her face along with Tomoe. Moca of course is using her phone to take pictures of this because memories like these are the best to have documented after all~

What they were not expecting though was Himari locking lips with Tsgumi in a rather soft and chaste kiss and then proceeding to immediately pass out leaning heavily on the girl who had just barely managed not to fall over at the ‘attack’ Himari had waged. 

All Tsugumi is able to do is giggle at that, because honestly? This really was the girl that she had fallen in love with as well, even before that kiss last year. She thinks she has always known about her own feelings towards the pink haired girl and she was glad that it seems like the girl who holds the key to her heart loves her back. Now… how was she going to get her soulmate into a more comfortable position without dropping her?


End file.
